Paris, Part One

Yes, that's Paris, France, and it means I went there.  :-)


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So about a month or so ago, John suggested that we go to Paris for my birthday, and I stared at him in disbelief because that is what you do when someone hands you the fulfillment of a childhood dream on a plate.   "We could have dinner at the Eiffel Tower," he said.  "Why don't you make reservations?  We could go by train."

I was so floored by this that I didn't even blog that we were going just in case I might jinx it.


After a period of disbelief, I got into action....sort of.  Keep in mind, neither John nor I have gone on a "going away" vacation for 20 years (yes, that's twenty, not a typo), much less one to a foreign country, so I was awash with uncertainty as to how to go about it.  Also, I have never gone on a train in a foreign country, so I was at a loss how to do that, too.

I searched on the internet, asked other expats, and still felt clueless.  See, for those who have gone on "going away" vacations (by that I mean the kind where you go far away from home and check in to a hotel for more than a couple of days) on a fairly frequent basis, there are some assumptions that you have that complete newbies are clueless about.  Such as, where do you go to reserve train tickets.  At home, I can go to the Amtrak web site, and know what to expect.  But here...well, first, I don't know how to read German, and even when there is an English translated site, it's still not easy to navigate, and do I print out a ticket, or do they send one to me in the mail, and how long does it take if they do?  I have no idea.

And then there was the hotel.  I have no idea what's a good hotel and what's not in Paris.  How do I know which hotels are comfortable yet affordable?  I know things are really expensive there, but at the same time I don't want to be uncomfortable.  I can look on line, read the reviews, but my idea of affordable is clearly not what seems to be offered on either Expedia or Travelocity.  What if I chose one of the lower priced ones and it was a dive?  Ack!

Then there are the Eiffel Tower restaurants.  There are three; the first level is basically a snack bar, the second level (up the elevators) is fine dining, and the third is super-fine dining.  You have to reserve a table way ahead of time for the second and third, and then it looks like you have to state ahead of time what you want to eat.  Aieeee!!!!

I began to feel overwhelmed.

But dang it, it was Paris!  A place I've wanted to see every since I was a child!  I would persevere!

Anna gave me a few links to places we might go.   I looked at each one, and since I really didn't have a clue about quality vs. price, I chose the one that was the closest to the Champs Élysées and the Arc de Triomphe, as I knew the Tour de France would finish there on July 25th.  Well, and affordable.

Oh, did John have ulterior motives?  Well, let's just say it was fortuitous that my birthday, our wedding anniversary, and the timing of the final stage of the Tour all fell within the space of a few days.  :-D

Truth to tell, I didn't mind aiding and abetting at all, since we would be celebrating our wedding anniversary, so this little vacation would be for both of us.  He could have the Tour and all the bicycle culture he could handle, and I would have...Paris!  How cool is that?

Plus, it's not like we couldn't visit Paris again to see more sights, because I found it's only a few hours away by train, and it'd be a shame to miss the final stage of the Tour, especially since it's the last time Lance Armstrong will be competing.  It'd be a relaxing weekend vacation, and we'd walk around and see a few things, take a few pictures, and go back to see other things, because even I knew there were too many things to see even in one weekend.

So I set about making reservations at the Élysées Parc Monseau.  There are pictures, of course, of the rooms, and since they looked all right, I went ahead and reserved a room for two.  The restaurant at the Eiffel Tower...I felt just a little overwhelmed when faced with two different restaurants and having to choose menus ahead of time, and....

I bailed.  I was still trying to get to Paris.  I'd deal with meals after we got there.  I wasn't that invested in eating at the Eiffel Tower anyway; it was enough just to go to Paris for now.  Food--you can get food anywhere.  One thing at a time.

Okay.  So, travel agency, because I needed an expert on local travel.  Yes, I wimped out.

Paid more than I thought I would for the train tickets, but oh well.  I'm pretty sure that if I had ordered them a few weeks earlier they may well have been less expensive.  Live and learn.  However, we were alerted to the Paris Visite card, which enables one to have unlimited travel on the Metro and discount to various touristy places.  This, also, I decided to get when we got there.  Besides, I had borrowed Rick Steve's Paris guide from Anna.  Everyone said it was easy to navigate the Paris Metro.

What the heck.   It wouldn't hurt to wing it, right?

So, on Thursday, the 23rd of July, we went to the Geilenkirchen and took the train to Aachen.  (The Train to Aachen.  Why does that sound like a suspense novel?)